Black color materials useful in information recording, such as, an electrophotographic toner and an ink for inkjet printing, include carbon black, aniline black, black iron oxide, black titanium oxide and the like. The black color materials are being utilized also as substrates for imparting a black color or a light-shielding property to a glass or other transparent or translucent medium, a black matrix material for plasma display and/or liquid crystal display, an agricultural light-shielding film and the like.
Carbon black is an organic pigment having a high color density (coloring per unit weight), a high blackness degree and high light fastness. Toners containing carbon black have lower charging with high dielectric loss, and both factors reduce transfer efficiency and degrade image quality. Black pigments are known to be more conductive than other pigments and thus, such carbon black pigments are believed to form conductive pathways through the toner particle. Therefore, there remains a need to reduce dielectric loss, and thus, improve charging to enable lower cost hyperpigmented low melt black toners.